Steve Agbota, [email protected]

Maritime sector plays a prominent role in the economy of most nations. The maritime industry holds the key to the growth and development of maritime nations through poverty reducing, creating wealth, promoting skills acquisition and encouraging entrepreneurship.

Maritime nations like China, Brazil, Russia and India have unlocked the potential in this sector by implementing policies and programmes, that have capacity to boost their economy. Therefore there are huge opportunities in the sector if properly harnessed.

Maritime sector encompasses all enterprises engaged in the business of designing, chandelling, constructing, manufacturing, acquiring, operating, supplying, repairing and maintaining vessels, component parts, managing and operating shipping lines, stevedoring, customs brokerage services, shipyards, dry docks, marine railways, marine repair shops, shipping and freight forwarding services and among other enterprises.

Moreso, the industry also embraces all the maritime related business activities, which take place within the country’s maritime environment, including offshore economic activities like fishing, salvage, towage, underwater resources and on-shore economic activities such as port activities, maritime transport known as shipping, ship construction and repairs and maintenance activities.

Amidst its vast opportunities, a major challenge in Nigeria’s maritime sector is the issue of foreign domination due to the government’s inability to implement policies that can drive local operators’ participation in the industry.

Today, foreign companies dominate virtually every aspect of Nigeria’s coastal shipping trade, contrary to the provisions of the Coastal and Inland Shipping Act 2003, otherwise called the Cabotage Act. Foreign firms have been the ones reaping most of the benefits of the policies put in place by the government while the local operators are often pushed out of business.

According to stakeholders, developed maritime nations around the world attained success in shipping by protecting indigenous operators. But Nigeria’s inability to curb the influx of foreigners, especially in areas with sufficient supply of competent local manpower is a failure of the Federal Government and detrimental to the nation’s economy.

Stakeholders who gathered at the Taiwo Afolabi Annual Maritime Conference (TAAM), with the theme “Innovations and Practical Reforms towards Sustainable Growth in the Maritime Sector,” recently faulted government policies, which were crafted deliberately to fail in order to favour foreign firms and frustrate indigenous participation.

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For instance , the Executive Vice Chairman of ENL Consortium and the Chairman Seaport terminal operators of Nigeria (STOAN), Princess Vicky Haastrup, said the reason many Nigerian vessel owners have lost out in the business can be attributed to bad laws and policies often designed in favour of the foreigners. This she said is coupled with lack of enabling laws that will support the indigenous participation. She also faulted  the Cabotage Act which was meant to protect indigenous participation.

According to her, many of the International Oil Companies (IOCs) prefer using foreign vessels to carry their goods thereby running indigenous vessel owners out of business, even as she disclosed that a Nigerian woman named Mrs Uju Ifejika just acquired the biggest vessel in Nigeria at the cost of over $10 millions, she expressed fear that Nigeria policies and laws do not do not support indigenous participation.

According to her “ Nigerians needs to participate in the business of acquiring vessels. Having said that, we need an enabling law that will support this, just yesterday, a Nigerian woman named Uju Ifejika acquired the biggest vessel owned by Nigerians. I salute her courage because our policies and law do not support indigenous participation.

“She must have acquired the vessels with the support of the banks because I asked someone about the cost of the vessels and we are talking about $10 million. So if by the end of the day she did not get the support of the IOCs, how will she be able to pay back the loans? So our people need to be encouraged, although we have an association of vessel owners in Nigeria; but how many of them have vessels today, because the IOCs were not supporting them. Government should not watch but let them put policies in place that to give indigenous participation 80 per cent and foreigners 20 percent or something like that of maritime trade,” she said.

Similarly, Group Executive Vice-Chairman of SIFAX Group, Dr Taiwo Afolabi, who spoke through Mr. Adekunle Oyinloye Managing Director of the Group, called on the Federal Government through the Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDA’s) in the maritime sector to ensure implementation of various policies and reforms for transformation and growth of the maritime sector.

He noted that Nigerian maritime industry does not lack innovations due to the constant engagements and collaboration between the operators and the regulatory agencies, and called for a strong implementation and feedback mechanism, adding that head of maritime agencies that have initiated reform processes should be allowed to see them through to the end before they are removed.

However, he lamented the aggravated attacks on vessels at berth at various terminals in Nigeria by sea robbers and hoodlums and appealed to government and its relevant agencies to further fortify the nation’s coastal and maritime boundaries against criminals.

Also speaking at occasion, a former President Association of Nigerian License Customs Agent (ANLCA) Prince Olayiwola Shittu, noted that though there are laws and policies in place to favour indigenous owners, they were however crafted to fail. He questioned, “Do we have law? Yes, are they good? Yes, but these laws are crafted deliberately to fail, whenever you put consideration into our laws then it is bound to fail and that is why we are repeating the same thing every year, we said this same thing last year and we are repeating it again this year at seminars and  it is the same thing we say why because our policies are crafted to fail”.

For his part, Chairman, Ports Consultative Council (PCC), Chief Kunle Folarin, argued that there are no models to drive indigenous participation in the country, adding that there is need to know the objectives of the government in promoting the maritime sector.